England vs Italy.

Just shows how one dimensional the english players are. Off the cuff rugby is well and truly dead..

nice_guy80 wrote: »

robots playing rugby

You're right.
This is their day job. These men are professional rugby players. They haven't turned up for a run around of tag rugby on a weekend with some mates. They are supposed to know these rules back to front, not be asking the referee how to play the game when it happens.
Their reaction, collectively, has made them look stupid and arrogant.
I'm actually heartened by the English rugby fans who are telling Matt Dawson to cop himself in. The hurt pridevand belligerence reflects worse on them than their inability to think outside the box when they were on the pitch.

Hard to guess how Jones will react to this.

Hughes was abysmal but England basically have no one else to play 8. Maybe Harrison or Ben Morgan could be called up? Jones must be praying on Big Billy being fit for Dublin.

Hartley was anonymous and completely failed to lead the team at all in the first half. It'd be a ballsy move even by Eddie's standards to drop his captain. Also maybe an admittence that Hartley was a poor choice.

Farrell had probably his worst ever outing in an English jersey. On the plus side, he's unlikely to play that badly again. On the negative side, if he does, England will lose to Scotland.

Cole was at his penalty machine worst. Didn't lock the scrum either. He's been a bit cack for a while now but Eddie always seemed to like him. That goodwill might be used up.

Haskell was probably England's most experienced player, and the only one with Super Rugby experience. All the same he seemed absolutely baffled, and utterly anonymous. Undroppable right now because of the relative inexperience of the backrow but surely he must be on thin ice.

Ford wasn't great, didn't get many chances to attack. Campagnaro used him as a doormat.

Care was a mess in the first half but got hooked just as he was starting to play well and run the show. England then proceeded to struggle for 20 minutes as they adapted to Youngs. Bizarre.

May, Marler, Brown, Lawes, Te'o, and Watson might as well have not been on the pitch for all they offered.

Only Daly, Itoje, Launchbury and Nowell came out of today with any credit. Even the usual infallible Itoje gave away some very stupid penalties in the first half. Eddie has his work cut out.

Former Former wrote: »

Indeed we have! Of course, we conceded six, but still...

What year?

Former Former wrote: »

Ah here, don't be calling me out on my "facts".

<frantic googling>

2006

Did we not score four the year BOD got his hat trick?

Edit: Nope, just the hat trick

errlloyd wrote: »

It's very hard to know how we would have dealt with it. But it is notable that our strongest cluster of leadership is around that zone. Murray, Sexton, Heaslip. Now to be fair, Murray and Sexton have been known to get grumpy (Murray when the Scots targeted him, Sexton when the ads are louder than TV, when he misses a red light, when he ties the wrong angle knot in his lace, when he plays well, when he plays badly, when everyone plays well etc etc), but I'd still back them to sort it.

Well Murray certainly did against Aus in November. First time they did it, he got caught out; passed to Pocock trying to buy a penalty and that backfired. Next time he just picked and went himself and the third time he gave it to a forward to rumble up.

Just beggars belief that the English couldn't wrap their heads around it. There was a shot (when Poite was explaining that he wasn't their coach) of Venter absolutely breaking his hole at it all.

CMOTDibbler wrote: »

Well Murray certainly did against Aus in November. First time they did it, he got caught out; passed to Pocock trying to buy a penalty and that backfired. Next time he just picked and went himself and the third time he gave it to a forward to rumble up.

Just beggars belief that the English couldn't wrap their heads around it. There was a shot (when Poite was explaining that he wasn't their coach) of Venter absolutely breaking his hole at it all.

It was Mike Catt but the lols were still real.
Haskell trying to play it off that he asked Poite "what he wanted to see from them" rather than "what do we do?" which everyone else heard.

Monye was saying that England had finally got their heads around this (they hadn't) just before Nathan Hughes got in the way of a Nowell pick and go. In fairness to Nowell he got it though.

Surely yesterday puts any doubt whether Nowell or May should start. Will be interesting what happens when Watson is fit. Daly to 13 Maybe? Or even 15?

razorblunt wrote: »

It was Mike Catt but the lols were still real.
Haskell trying to play it off that he asked Poite "what he wanted to see from them" rather than "what do we do?" which everyone else heard.

Monye was saying that England had finally got their heads around this (they hadn't) just before Nathan Hughes got in the way of a Nowell pick and go. In fairness to Nowell he got it though.

exactly, Hartley, the England captain had asked a question of Poite earlier don't forget had been told exactly what was happening and how the law was being interpreted, he couldn't wrap his head around it and so Haskell to his credit approached Poite. He themn asked a badly worded question which got the answer it deserved


"Sir - this ruck thing, what can we do?"


Its not Poites job to advise them, they have a coaching team for that.
That between a pack of highly paid professionals none of them could come up with an answer to it until 35 minutes into the match was shameful. they deserve to be ridiculed for such ineptitude and Eddie Jones should shut up, show some class and respectfully hold his hands up to be being out thought. Long term Connor has done him a massive favour, he has shown him a glaring lack of nouse amongst his team. Get your lads out of the gym and studying the laws instead Eddie